#monkeesmeme - What? You're Not Inspired?!

Funny story:  My mom, wanting to be supportive of my education, showed up at Publix with $5 bills in her pocket and rallied three produce guys to do her video.

OK.  So my meme was not successful with the group.  But three friends participated and the videos are too funny!  If you haven't watched them yet, check out the twitter feed on this page.

In retrospect, five factors debilitated what I think is an amazingly fun idea:

1.  Not everyone knows who "The Monkees" are, never mind what the signature walk is.  They were before my time, but we did this silliness as kids anyway.  I never saw the show but I did see them once in concert :)

2.  Most people have pride and won't debase themselves in such a ridiculous manner.

3.  The video format was too complex, requiring people to film, upload to YouTube, and then tweet out.  I had to help every one of my participants.

4.  The meme required at least three people to be present: two to perform and one to film (unless you prop the camera like I did).

5.  I didn't have enough time to rally everyone.  I read the post on Tuesday and posted my video mid-day Wednesday.  People are busy having summer fun (or like us) finishing up the term.  I know with more time I would have convinced more of my friends and family, because that's the kind of gal I am.

Oh well.  I had fun.  And who knows... maybe #monkeesmeme may still take off.

I've had fun experiencing Web 2.0 with y'all.  Enjoy your break!

#MonkeesMeme - A three day challenge! Can you do it?

Hey, all you goofballs out there!  You have three days, until Friday August 7th to be part of the MonkeesMeme.

Film whoever you can convince to sing the first line of "Hey, Hey We're the Monkees"  doing the signature walk.

Upload to YouTube, then tweet to #monkeesmeme.  Let's see how many places and how many monkees we can catch in three days!

Don't know the song or the walk... because our version just is a little fuzzy? Here's the original trailer:

Thanks for playing :)

Web 2.0 Learning Curve Revisited

My very first blog posted this picture:

In Blog 1, I admitted to being clueless.  I predicted I would achieve "Naively Confident" by the course's close.  So where am I five week's later?

I think I skipped the whole confident part and jumped right to "Discouragingly Realistic."   I now know about various Web 2.0 tools and have preferences, for which I am extremely grateful. I have opinions about what makes a good blog post, community post, and tweet, although I certainly couldn't teach "best practices."  I have learned what I like and don't like.  I have learned the value of collective knowledge and respect it most highly.

But what I have not conquered is how to juggle all the social media I want to follow.  I utilize Hootsuite, so that helps.  But where is the time?

I think my personality just doesn't lend itself to massive time on computer unless I need to be here for an assignment.  I have never been one to randomly search the web, view videos, or waste hours on Facebook.  I'd rather be running, biking, cooking, playing with my son, reading... just about anything.  Which is funny because I do so much on the computer.

So what have I learned about myself in this Web 2.0 excursion?  I love the possibilities.  I have direction.  Now I need to train myself to integrate it into my daily routine, like I yoga every morning. If only Web 2.0 could make me skinny as well as worldly.

Image Link: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3YQQsaDSob9iqxpm_TwlRYtxz3g7fe3GUHT3ZLS5vJm-EpWC358EoR2vSJa90qAuJszVLoUgoaBqJKoTP6I8EEq644c8DOv2o3wRJAKvYjZmcESdcip_L7Pqn1CuzDZibq0AN3eu8NMKE/s1600/Learning-Curve.png

You Can Bring a Horse to Water... Reflections on Community

Actually, I have a spin on the old adage which I coined during the tortuous years, (yes years), of potty-training my son...

You can bring a boy to the pot,

 but you can't make him pee.

With my knowledgable colleague, Yao Zhongrui, we created a Blackboard organization for our research group of 21 PhD students in ISLT.  The vision is that we can share our research and papers for peer feedback, comment on interesting articles in our field, and develop our voice with the greater Instructional Systems world.  We integrated Web 2.0 technologies such as Diigo, Twitter, Facebook, ResearchGate and many more.  Sounds great, right?

I have no faith in "If you build it, they will come."

How, then, will this marvelous online community, (if I do say so myself), get off the ground?

I have a plan!

1.  Specifically tell people to post on the appropriate tool.  Yes, tell them!  "What a great idea.  You should post it on the discussion board."  "Interesting tweet, I'm going to retweet with our group hashtag."

2.  Model.  This part scares me because I am new to the field.  But as I come across cool sites, I'm going to tag, annotate, post.  I'm going to respond to other people's posts.  I'm going to recklessly give-it-a-go.

3.  Highlight, praise, affirm group member's contributions.  "Wow, look at the conversation you started on the LinkedIn page.  Fifteen ISLT people commented on your insights.  Apparently your ideas strike a chord with others."

Repeat... and don't lost faith.

I have no idea how long it will take for this community to be fully realized.  But I know it can work!  I know it will benefit us all!  I think I can, I think I can.

If you are interested, here is an overview of our Research Group Blackboard organization.

How Do Backchannel Discussions Work at Conferences?

Vanessa Dennen's 2011 article "Conversations on the Hashtag:  Does Conference Twitter Use Promote Professional Discourse" prompted me to look at conferences in a new way.  How do attendees use social media for professional discourse?

Every year, Palm Beach County Schools hosts a Technology Conference.  Although it is not the same scale as ISTE or FETC, it is amazing!  Here is a link to last year's conference if you are interested:  http://techconf.palmbeachschools.org/.

The PBC Tech Conference uses two social media platforms for backchannel discussions:

• Twitter  #pbcsdtechconf
• Edmodo - groups for a Main Wall and groups for each session

So let's look at how the three exchanges compare.  Screen shots are at the bottom.

Twitter - (Image 1) Unlike the article, I did not see any tweets about where to get coffee or making fun of participants.  This is likely due to the fact that we are Palm Beach County teachers and we'd like to keep our jobs.  All tweets were about presentations.  In fact, almost all tweets conveyed a specific tip, linked to a website, or included an picture or video.  Most tweets were retweeted and many included @ for attribution.

Edmodo Main Wall - (Image 2) appears to be used only for administrative questions.  In years past, people would post about their session reflections on Edmodo.  I believe as Twitter has become more common, the professional conversations have moved to that platform.

Edmodo Session Groups - (Image 3) Most sessions simply use Edmodo groups to provide handouts.  However, I specifically include a poll, a thread for questions, and a thread for backchannel discussions.  During the session, I refer back to Edmodo frequently, answering questions and acknowledging group ideas.  Sometimes we view links or documents people have posted.  The image below is from a different conference, but it demonstrates how these threads can be used.

Dennen, V. P. (2011). Conversations on the hashtag: Does conference Twitter use promote professional discourse? Paper presented at International Conference on the e-Society. Berlin: Germany

#1 Tip for Building Community

Wordle by Balboa Park Learning Institute, Flikr

This week we are tasked with building an authentic community.  This is no small task.   In collaboration with classmate "Scholarship Life"  http://yao88219.blogspot.com/, we are creating a Blackboard organization for Dr. Dennen's research group, PhD students at various points in their program.

Today, we presented our draft organization for feedback in a face-to-face meeting.  Nodding heads affirmed the need for the online community.  Comments will result in our revising a few interface elements.

The experience leads me to my #1 tip for building community:

To effectively build community, build it with community, not simply for the community.

I could not image all the features the group would prefer on my own.  There truly is power in collective thinking.  Please, post other community building tips.  We need your brilliance as well.

Why Do You Blog? Survey Results & Gadget Comparison

The results are in...

Are you surprised at the results?  I find them very interesting.  More people seek to inform yet a close second is to personally explore the author's thoughts.  I would have expected some responses for "to entertain my audience" and "to connect with like-minded folks."  No one chose to fill in the blank under "other."

How do the gadgets compare?
In this poll, I used the POWr Poll gadget.  In the previous poll, I used Blogger's Poll gadget.  Each has benefits and weaknesses.

With the Blogger gadget, respondents can choose multiple answers.  There are several different poll options in POWr Poll that are not available in Blogger, (see right), but none allow multiple answers to be tabulated separately.  During our discussion forum, you wished you could choose 2 or 3 answers.  I agree!

The radio poll, which I used, only allows one answer.  If you choose multiple checkboxes, all of the responses are grouped together.  For example "To inform my audience, to entertain my audience, Because its required for this class."  Only responses with that exact mix will tabulate together.  Blogger does not have an option for respondents to type in a response for "other."

Blogger does not allow the author to edit the poll once the first response has been tallied.  POWr Poll allows editing at any time.  In addition, formatting of the poll can be personalized in POWr Poll, including: font size, type, and color; background.

When my first responses came into POWr  Poll, the responses were presented in both a table form, downloadable as a .cvs, and in pie graph.  However, the pie graph view was not available when I closed the poll.  Blogger only allowed the responses to be viewed in the blog itself.  Readers can see their cumulative responses immediately, a feature not available in POWr Poll.

Blogger results disappear when the poll is taken down, whereas POWrPoll is available in a separate website and can be accessed indefinitely, as you post and remove numerous polls.

One cool feature of POWr poll is the chat feature.  While I was designing the poll, a chat box opened from the company asking if I needed help.  I asked about the multiple checkboxes issue, and the operator confirmed the situation I described above.  I like having help readily available via chat.

Overall, I prefer POWr Poll but there are some glitches that they need to address.  If you have another poll gadget for blogs that you prefer, please share with us.